By JP Maroney
Great leaders know their personal strengths, and look for people who will offset their personal weaknesses. They surround themselves with people who are strong in areas where they are weak, knowing that in order to build a strong organization, they must build a team of specialists who can excel in their own unique area of expertise. That involves three important steps.
Identify Your Own Strengths and Weaknesses
We each have our own areas where we excel, and areas where we struggle. Great leaders know this and admit it. Conventional wisdom has been to try to improve in those areas where we struggle. Great leaders do the opposite. Instead, they identify their personal strengths and weaknesses, and then focus on excelling in the areas where they are strongest, knowing that they can find other people to compensate for their weaknesses.
Identify and Recruit People Who Compensate for Your Weaknesses
Once they have identified their strongest and weakest areas, great leaders identify and recruit other people who can compensate for their own personal weaknesses. This is absolutely the fastest way to successfully build a strong organization. Great leaders know the ultimate goal, and then pull together the people who can help them achieve that goal.
Great leaders seem to attract quality people like a magnet. Like seeks out like. Winners seek out winners. Losers seek out losers. Mediocre people seek out mediocre people. Great people seek out great leaders. They want to be part of something exciting. They want to be a part of a positive experience. Great leaders look for those quality people, especially the ones who possess talents in areas where they struggle personally. But they also realize that having great people is not enough.
Focus Each Person in an Area Where They Will Excel
Having the right people, and maximize the potential of each individual are two distinctly different things. Great leaders know how to identify where each person best fits in the organization and then allow them to excel in that area. They go beyond the initial job interview, and spend time with each of their people, helping them identify what they do best, what they love to do, and where they can make the greatest contribution to the organization. Great leaders realize that each person has a unique set of knowledge, skills and talents, and they do everything in their power to see that each person’s unique set of strengths is maximized to the fullest in a way that benefits the organization. The leader sees their responsibility as a casting director, placing each person in a role where they will shine.
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JP Maroney is a business growth strategist, best-selling author and award-winning speaker. Receive his FREE book, “5 Ways to Double or Triple Your Business” by visiting www.JPMaroney.com
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How to solicit, analyze and implement employee ideas for organizational improvement.
Involving people in the organization’s improvement process provides one of the most powerful tools for improving employee satisfaction. Most employees, at one time or another, go home and tell their spouse or a friend, “If we would just __________, we could save the company money.†Or, “If we could ___________, our customers would be more satisfied, and would buy from us again.†Yet, because there is no system in place, those ideas are never captured, never considered, and never used.
One of the first questions I ask organizations when I consult with them is, “What organized system do you have in place for consistently soliciting, analyzing and implementing employee suggestions for improving your organization?†Most of them just look at me with blank faces. They are not doing it.
It’s obvious that the leaders of these organizations either think it’s too much trouble, don’t know how, or just flat don’t care what their employees think. I’d guess that 75-80% of the organizations where I ask that question can’t give me an affirmative answer. That’s sad.
These companies are missing out on a terrific way to improve employee satisfaction, and also to improve the overall organization. Involving employees in the improvement process requires a system for soliciting, analyzing, and implementing ideas.
Soliciting Employee Ideas For Improvement
If an organization wants happy, satisfied employees, it must allow them to contribute ideas for improving the organization. Why? Because people will pour their hearts and souls into something they help create. I’ve seen it happen in companies, in non-profit organizations, in churches, and I’ve seen it happen in clubs and organizations.
Put systems in place to consistently solicit employee suggestions for improving the organization. After all, they are the people on the front lines actually doing the work, building the parts, and servicing the customers.
Put out employee suggestion boxes, and ask for suggestions during staff meetings. Once the ideas are gathered, there must also be a systematic way of analyzing ideas to see which should be tested and implemented.
Analyzing Improvement Ideas
Obviously every suggestion will not be usable, at least not immediately. So a process must be developed for analyzing which ideas should be pursued. Again, involving employees in the process is vital, especially if management wants the employees to accept ownership of the changes which will result from the new ideas.
One organization we work with has a quality steering committee. This committee includes one or two individuals from each department in the company. Part of the committee’s responsibility is to analyze suggestions made by employees, and make recommendations for implementation.
Implementing Improvement Ideas
For the process to work, some of the ideas must be implemented. Organizations can’t just talk the talk; they must also walk the walk. If employee suggestions are never implemented, employees will eventually assume that their input is not truly valued.
Employee suggestions should be included in the organization’s planning process. When setting goals and developing strategies, leadership should be asking, “How can we implement the ideas that have come from the people on the front line.â€
(Note: this article is an excerpt from JP Maroney’s book, The Productivity Path: Your Roadmap For Improving Employee Performance. To learn more about this book, Click Here!)
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Interested in publishing this article in your magazine, newsletter, blog, website or article directory? Send an email to info at jpmaroney dot com or call 1-800-304-5758.
Now, you and your team can immediately improve focus, clarity and results! Here are four tips…
1) Clarify Your Mission
You might be surprised how many companies, departments, and project teams fail to agree on, and follow a clearly-defined, well-understood mission. Make sure your team doesn’t fall into this trap.
Simply stated, your mission is the team’s reason for being – its purpose!
For example, if your team is responsible for front-line, customer service, your mission might be to exceed your customer’s expectations by providing solutions to their problems, and building long-term relationships.
If your team is responsible for new products, your mission might be to create innovative products and services that make the client’s life easier and more enjoyable — Or products and service that save the client money, Etc. You get the idea!
Be sure that each member of the team knows the mission, can articulate that mission, and understands the role they play in fulfilling the mission.
2) Set Team Goals!
Every team should have definite objectives or goals. Here are three guidelines for setting team goals:
Number One, the objectives, or goals, should support the team’s mission or purpose. In other words, every goal the team pursues should assist the team in fulfilling its mission. Remember, the mission is the entire reason for the team.
Number Two, goals should be measurable. For example, instead of saying, we want to increase sales this month; a specific goal should be set for a definite increase. A measurable goal might be, this month we will increase sales by fifteen percent over last month’s sales totals. Or, this month we will increase sales by fifteen thousand dollars over last year’s sales totals for this same month. That’s a measurable goal.
Number Three, goals should have a date. In other words, instead of saying we want to grow our customer base to include five hundred customers, you should add a date, and say “our goal is to grow our customer base to five hundred customers by the end of the fourth quarter.”
3) Create A Plan
A team plan is simply a written blueprint for the team’s success. It spell’s out the team’s mission, outlines the teams goals, and lays out a strategy for fulfilling the team mission and reaching the goals.
This plan should clearly state the responsibilities of each person on the team, what they do, and how they do it. It should outline what each person does, and how he or she is accountable.
A written team plan should also break each of the team’s goals down into specific action steps, and indicate who is responsible for each item on the list. This team plan provides a powerful tool for keeping everyone focused on the team’s mission and objectives, and also helps avoid any confusion about the responsibilities of each team member.
4) Conduct Progress Reviews
These are simply meetings where the team members come together to discuss the team’s results and future plans. Here are some items you should consider covering in a Team Progress Review.
* Check to make sure the team is effectively accomplishing its mission.
* Review the team’s goals and make necessary adjustments. This is a great time to keep the team goals out in front of everyone.
* Review the team plan and determine if any updates or changes need to be made to make the team more effective. Talk about the things that are working well, and discuss what areas need to be improved.
* Clarify responsibilities for each team member and the actions they need to take next.
* Set a date for the next Progress Review. When conducting one of these meetings, have a printed agenda for every participant, start and end on time, and keep the meeting on track by following the agenda.
And one final note, a team has to be willing to work together to stay on track and these progress reviews will keep the team focused instead of turning into a chaotic nightmare. ###
